DIY Apple Studio Display uses 2014 iMac to save $730

YouTuber strips old iMac of its components and turns it into a 5K monitor.

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[ERIFNOMI]

Why would you do this? I thought the whole point of buying a Pro Display XDR was for color accuracy. If you just want a 5k monitor, there are other brands out there.

Because they can. It's an interesting DIY project that turns E-waste into something useful. If you want perfect you pay full price.

Well, it isn’t E-waste. He bought a fully functioning iMac as per the article.

When you can’t load the latest MacOS with security updates, you either find a way to load ChromeOS or Linux, or it basically is e-waste.

I might actually try this one day with my wife’s 27” iMac

I wonder if this can be done with even older iMacs. Most 27" models still work, but the internals are unsupported by Apple, so they mostly go unused.

Could the internals of, say, a 2010 iMac, be replaced with something like a Mac Mini? Or a MacBook Air logic board? Or is it possible to find an appropriate display driver circuit so that it can be converted to a monitor?

I assume the biggest issue is connecting the panel to anything else, since it's probably some proprietary ribbon cable nobody but Apple uses. Or am I wrong to assume that?

Apple doesn't make the panel. They're all going to be some flavor of LVDS. I took apart a circa 2011 iMac (maybe onder? Whenever they were using 1680x1050 displays) and threw in a cheap driver from eBay to have a bench display I never ended up using. Nothing fancy about the panels themselves. They're LG panels, just like half of the rest of the panels in the world.

 

[ERIFNOMI]

Why would you do this? I thought the whole point of buying a Pro Display XDR was for color accuracy. If you just want a 5k monitor, there are other brands out there.

Those of us who stare at static text all day are looking for a monitor around 218 ppi monitor at 27", something that 4k can't do. Color accuracy, HDR, and frame rate is secondary if needed at all.

The cheapest commercial monitor that matches is from LG and is still around $1,300. This DYI mod easily meets those needs and beats the cheapest commercial competitor price by a wide margin.

I stare at text all day on monitors with half that density. What am I doing wrong?

I get paid to stare at text all day, and the price of this monitor over three years is like 1/4 of 1% of my total cost to my employer. Why wouldn't they pay that if it makes me 5-10% more productive?

No argument from me. I didn't pay for my work monitors either. I told them what I wanted and it wasn't the $99 Dell special and they bought them. The monitors are fuck all compared to the other hardware I get to play with.

But I prefer ultra wides. 110ppi is sufficient for me. I can already make the text smaller than I can see. A higher resolution will just mean I need to scale everything. I can only cram so much into a given area before my eyes are the limiting factor.

You don't really get HiDPI and scaling at all, do you? Talking about "text smaller than I can see" and all of that. The text is the effing same size, just way sharper?

I understand scaling. I mentioned it multiple times.

 

[lp0_on_fire]

A Chinese guy at a conference a couple years ago gave me the impression that re-purposing LCDs in this way isn't unusual in China.

 

[lp0_on_fire]

What is it with Youtubers making video preview pictures where they make the dumbest-looking face possible? Is there a metric somewhere that says people are more likely to click on videos if the person doing it looks like a fucking idiot? Cause it definitely has the complete opposite effect on me.

(Sorry about the off-topic, just wanted to vent on that particular subject)

One of my colleagues (pre-covid at least) was pretty successful at travel vlogging, but to go through her videos you would think she suffered a head injury sometime around 2016 as she went from authoritative travel information for off the beaten path in France and Spain to OMG Best Ice Cream Ever!

 

[Keith Tanner]

I'm posting this from a 2014 5k iMac, with a Mac Studio on order and no 5k monitor to use with it. The described project is very tempting...

Ditto on the computer, no Mac Studio on order yet but this will only make the decision easier.

 

[DovePig]

I understand scaling. I mentioned it multiple times.

Yet you mention "I stare at text all day on monitors with half that density. What am I doing wrong?"

What's your gripe, then? Obviously a 220 ppi text is much clearer to read than 110 ppi. Yet you mention "small text"...

 

[ERIFNOMI]

I understand scaling. I mentioned it multiple times.

Yet you mention "I stare at text all day on monitors with half that density. What am I doing wrong?"

What's your gripe, then? Obviously a 220 ppi text is much clearer to read than 110 ppi. Yet you mention "small text"...

Where are you seeing a gripe? Calm down brother.

 

[caramelpolice]

The differences are hard to spot in comparison images he shared.

I dunno, the difference in black levels looks pretty stark, especially in that second shot.

 

[Nop666]

Maybe it's just me, but the color differences in the comparison images seem quite noticeable (in particular, the DIY monitor's images seem too blue).

It does to me too, but in normal use, you probably wouldn't have both next to each other anyway.

That's not the point; it's about colour calibration, which is clearly off in the DIY version.

 

[Nop666]

What is it with Youtubers making video preview pictures where they make the dumbest-looking face possible? Is there a metric somewhere that says people are more likely to click on videos if the person doing it looks like a fucking idiot? Cause it definitely has the complete opposite effect on me.

(Sorry about the off-topic, just wanted to vent on that particular subject)

It's a marketing thing to catch your eye when you see the thumbnail on that vertical list next to the video you're actually watching. A lot of serious Youtubers hate using them, but they work.

 

[Nop666]

What is it with Youtubers making video preview pictures where they make the dumbest-looking face possible? Is there a metric somewhere that says people are more likely to click on videos if the person doing it looks like a fucking idiot? Cause it definitely has the complete opposite effect on me.

(Sorry about the off-topic, just wanted to vent on that particular subject)

I remember years ago Linus Sebastian responded to this on one of his live chats. Apparently, yes, if you look at the data the dumb face and bright colors drive engagement. The reason that everybody does it is that it works. So...don't hate the player, hate the game, I guess?

More like "hate our stupid monkey brains", but yeah.

 

[Tagbert]

If you just want a 5k monitor, there are other brands out there.

What brands other than LG?

There are some 5K2K (5120x2160) monitors out there sold as widescreen 5K monitors. The 2160 is insufficient resolution for a monitor the size of this 27”, but people still comment that it’s 5K (in one dimension).

For those commenting, when most of us talk about 5K monitors, we mean one of two 5120x2880 monitors available. Not the 5K2K monitors.

 

[caramelpolice]

Maybe it's just me, but the color differences in the comparison images seem quite noticeable (in particular, the DIY monitor's images seem too blue).

It does to me too, but in normal use, you probably wouldn't have both next to each other anyway.

That's not the point; it's about colour calibration, which is clearly off in the DIY version.

The differences could simply be down to a) the DIY model lacking True Tone (Apple's tech to adjust the white point to match ambient lighting) thus looking more blue and b) using an older panel with a narrower color gamut (the 2014 5K iMac panel didn't support P3/WCG).

 

[Readercathead]

Why would you do this? I thought the whole point of buying a Pro Display XDR was for color accuracy. If you just want a 5k monitor, there are other brands out there.

Because they can. It's an interesting DIY project that turns E-waste into something useful. If you want perfect you pay full price.

Edit Footnote: Colour accuracy is important but is not the be all and end all in every circumstance. For Video, once the project is final on your screen it gets displayed on a multitude of uncalibrated TVs, Monitors, Phones & Tablets, although for a project with multiple staff and machines accuracy is quite important. For Design there's Pantone, RAL etc.

You do it because you are a YouTuber and want the audience, of course! You need a gimmick, an angle, to get some traction in this very full late-stage YouTube ecosystem. This video is entertaining and educational, and it contributes to the conversation about whether the Studio Display is a good product or for whom it’s a good product. I enjoyed it, people who like DIY projects will like it. Even more entertaining than watching IFitIt videos.

 

[stux]

I'm amazed at how simple it is to repurpose. It seems that if it were economical to actually design a proper kit it'd work exceedingly well.

 

[Nop666]

Maybe it's just me, but the color differences in the comparison images seem quite noticeable (in particular, the DIY monitor's images seem too blue).

It does to me too, but in normal use, you probably wouldn't have both next to each other anyway.

That's not the point; it's about colour calibration, which is clearly off in the DIY version.

The differences could simply be down to a) the DIY model lacking True Tone (Apple's tech to adjust the white point to match ambient lighting) thus looking more blue and b) using an older panel with a narrower color gamut (the 2014 5K iMac panel didn't support P3/WCG).

Yes, that's completely legitimate. I'm assuming that the guy who did this hack didn't calibrate the screen afterwards, which is the first thing I would've done, because the only reason I'd buy or build a $$$ Mac screen is for colour accurate work. I wish he'd done that, because it'd show whether the panel holds up vs new ones or not.

 

[magpye]

Why would you do this? I thought the whole point of buying a Pro Display XDR was for color accuracy. If you just want a 5k monitor, there are other brands out there.

Because they can. It's an interesting DIY project that turns E-waste into something useful. If you want perfect you pay full price.

Edit Footnote: Colour accuracy is important but is not the be all and end all in every circumstance. For Video, once the project is final on your screen it gets displayed on a multitude of uncalibrated TVs, Monitors, Phones & Tablets, although for a project with multiple staff and machines accuracy is quite important. For Design there's Pantone, RAL etc.

You do it because you are a YouTuber and want the audience, of course! You need a gimmick, an angle, to get some traction in this very full late-stage YouTube ecosystem. This video is entertaining and educational, and it contributes to the conversation about whether the Studio Display is a good product or for whom it’s a good product. I enjoyed it, people who like DIY projects will like it. Even more entertaining than watching IFitIt videos.

If I had more time everything I own would be cobbled together like this. And I'm not going to be the only one here who feels that way, given that the audience for this article is somewhat self selected.

 

[MrPolkaPurple]

Maybe I'm missing something, but on my OLED (not a flex, just pointing out that the black levels are pretty dang accurate), the studio display on the left looks like a much closer true black. The display on the right, as some have pointed out, seems brighter. When looking at the areas that should be black, they are truly dark with no perceptible backlight on the left. While on the right, the blacks look comparatively dark-blue with backlight the bleeds through. So the blacks areas on the right actually have lit LEDs, where on the left, they are not lit. This is making the entire image seem brighter on the right. Like 100% of the LEDs on the panel on the right are backlit where as the left panel looks to have much better backlight control.

The easiest place to see this is images 2 and 3. In the very center, where the two images are connected, there is a small gap between the displays sitting on the desk. This vertical line going top to bottom should be close to true black. Images 2 and 3 have a background that is also close to true black. This means that we should see the two images blend seamlessly together with the background. But, on my OLED there are two distinct photos with a border line going straight down the middle. There is a difference in both color and brightness at the border. There is no perceptible backlight or colors/shades Also, the other colors look much more accurate on the left. The entire right image looks like its got a blue level washing over everything on the screen.

If you need a display for color accuracy, the display on the right is not going to cut it. Not saying there aren't better/cheaper options than the one of the left for accuracy though. Sure it has the 5k resolution, but you would still be better off buying an $800 alternative from another brand. I wouldn't pay $800 for the display on the right no matter the use case. Everything is going to look better on the left. Unless you must have 5k and can't find another option.

Disclaimer - The youtuber recorded the images on these displays using a video camera of some kind. Then he edited it on his computer. If we assume the whole video is edited using the same settings throughout, it looks like it's already over-saturated on the colors and who knows what other filters or color/contrast corrections were made to the recording. Then he uploaded to YouTube and now I'm looking at the image on my LG OLED. So we're somewhere around 4 levels removed from using my eyeballs standing in front of the two displays.

I'd be interested to see the iMac display compared before and after it was overhauled. I'm wondering if any calibration logic was lost in the DIY config that modified backlight or color settings. Resolution and brightness aside, it looks like a surprisingly bad image honestly. Like a generic LED monitor. I just looked at it on my iphone. Still looks bad there too. Maybe I should go see the eye doctor.

 

[OptimusP83]

Maybe it's just me, but the color differences in the comparison images seem quite noticeable (in particular, the DIY monitor's images seem too blue).

It does to me too, but in normal use, you probably wouldn't have both next to each other anyway.

That's not the point; it's about colour calibration, which is clearly off in the DIY version.

The differences could simply be down to a) the DIY model lacking True Tone (Apple's tech to adjust the white point to match ambient lighting) thus looking more blue and b) using an older panel with a narrower color gamut (the 2014 5K iMac panel didn't support P3/WCG).

Yes, that's completely legitimate. I'm assuming that the guy who did this hack didn't calibrate the screen afterwards, which is the first thing I would've done, because the only reason I'd buy or build a $$$ Mac screen is for colour accurate work. I wish he'd done that, because it'd show whether the panel holds up vs new ones or not.

Except he didn't "build an apple screen", he repurposed an old all-in-one's screen to be used as a general purpose monitor.

I too would love to see a followup where he tries to "fix" the colors, but frankly it wasn't the scope of his challenge, which was to repurpose an old 5k iMac as a monitor, not to "build a Studio Monitor for less" even though he does compare it directly to the studio in both quality and price.

 

[FxzlmS]

take home messages:

1) you have to actively mod an iMac to keep using its main HW component, the display, because Apple purposely removed the option to use it as an external display

2) 5K seems to be the holy grail for some, since it provides 25% resolution increase over 4K and everything below that 5K resolution is not acceptable. Surely has nothing to do with macOS being weird and backwards with its scaling modes. 8K monitors being available of course is irrelevant.

 

[SplatMan_DK]

Why would you do this? I thought the whole point of buying a Pro Display XDR was for color accuracy. If you just want a 5k monitor, there are other brands out there.

Because they can. It's an interesting DIY project that turns E-waste into something useful. If you want perfect you pay full price.

Well, it isn’t E-waste. He bought a fully functioning iMac as per the article.

When you can’t load the latest MacOS with security updates, you either find a way to load ChromeOS or Linux, or it basically is e-waste.

I might actually try this one day with my wife’s 27” iMac

I wonder if this can be done with even older iMacs. Most 27" models still work, but the internals are unsupported by Apple, so they mostly go unused.

Could the internals of, say, a 2010 iMac, be replaced with something like a Mac Mini? Or a MacBook Air logic board? Or is it possible to find an appropriate display driver circuit so that it can be converted to a monitor?

I assume the biggest issue is connecting the panel to anything else, since it's probably some proprietary ribbon cable nobody but Apple uses. Or am I wrong to assume that?

Apple doesn't make the panel. They're all going to be some flavor of LVDS. I took apart a circa 2011 iMac (maybe onder? Whenever they were using 1680x1050 displays) and threw in a cheap driver from eBay to have a bench display I never ended up using. Nothing fancy about the panels themselves. They're LG panels, just like half of the rest of the panels in the world.

Right.

So is there a homepage where I can identify the appropriate display driver, or is there a sticker on the panel itself if I open the machine?

Sorry for the n00b questions. It's just not my field, and I'd rather admit to my ignorance than foul things up...

 

[André1]

I'm surprised people didn't already know about this.

Anyway the 5K panel itself (LM270QQ1 or LM270QQ2) can be had for $200-300 and then the driver board is another $200.

I recommend the U49 or R1811 (new version) driver board as these comes with a USB-C connector.

If you search around you can also find it as a complete set.

 

[Norphy]

You know what would be a cool project? To bring something like the Framework Mainboard and this together, to update the guts of an obsolete iMac. I know you wouldn't get macOS on it, but it'd still be better than putting the entire lot into landfill. I have a mid 2010 iMac which has a perfectly good screen, albeit just 1440p. I'm using it in target display mode at the moment but that seems unnecessarily power hungry to just act as a display.

 

[Roonski]

I’m really amazed there was an existing adapter board to do this. Given that there are very few 5k monitors or panels out there, it’s not obvious to me why this would even exist.

 

[timber]

I never did understand why they didn't just offer a couple external ports you could use as well to turn the iMac into a dumb display. Monitors (if good) can last well past when the computer is slow.

Well, It's not that hard to understand why, isn't it?

 

[Nop666]

Why would you do this? I thought the whole point of buying a Pro Display XDR was for color accuracy. If you just want a 5k monitor, there are other brands out there.

Because they can. It's an interesting DIY project that turns E-waste into something useful. If you want perfect you pay full price.

Edit Footnote: Colour accuracy is important but is not the be all and end all in every circumstance. For Video, once the project is final on your screen it gets displayed on a multitude of uncalibrated TVs, Monitors, Phones & Tablets, although for a project with multiple staff and machines accuracy is quite important. For Design there's Pantone, RAL etc.

You do it because you are a YouTuber and want the audience, of course! You need a gimmick, an angle, to get some traction in this very full late-stage YouTube ecosystem. This video is entertaining and educational, and it contributes to the conversation about whether the Studio Display is a good product or for whom it’s a good product. I enjoyed it, people who like DIY projects will like it. Even more entertaining than watching IFitIt videos.

If I had more time everything I own would be cobbled together like this. And I'm not going to be the only one here who feels that way, given that the audience for this article is somewhat self selected.

Amen. I love it that there's still a popular website that caters to those of us who love hardware hacking over the usual consumer bullshit.

 

[gabest11]

Can Apple sue this guy for lost sales? Isn't this piracy?

 

[bhibcpu]

Can Apple sue this guy for lost sales? Isn't this piracy?

No. Modding your own hardware is not piracy.

 

[SplatMan_DK]

You know what would be a cool project? To bring something like the Framework Mainboard and this together, to update the guts of an obsolete iMac. I know you wouldn't get macOS on it, but it'd still be better than putting the entire lot into landfill. I have a mid 2010 iMac which has a perfectly good screen, albeit just 1440p. I'm using it in target display mode at the moment but that seems unnecessarily power hungry to just act as a display.

That's my exact case as well.

A logic board from a semi-recent MacBook Air and a display hardware driver is what I am thinking. And perhaps a bit of 3D printing to hold the components in place.

 

[SplatMan_DK]

Can Apple sue this guy for lost sales? Isn't this piracy?

No. Modding your own hardware is not piracy.

I agree that it shouldn't be. But your statement isn't exactly bullet proof legal advice. Various laws sadly says otherwise. Unlocking a gaming console or in-vehicle computer isn't completely free game.

 

[Nop666]

Maybe it's just me, but the color differences in the comparison images seem quite noticeable (in particular, the DIY monitor's images seem too blue).

It does to me too, but in normal use, you probably wouldn't have both next to each other anyway.

That's not the point; it's about colour calibration, which is clearly off in the DIY version.

The differences could simply be down to a) the DIY model lacking True Tone (Apple's tech to adjust the white point to match ambient lighting) thus looking more blue and b) using an older panel with a narrower color gamut (the 2014 5K iMac panel didn't support P3/WCG).

Yes, that's completely legitimate. I'm assuming that the guy who did this hack didn't calibrate the screen afterwards, which is the first thing I would've done, because the only reason I'd buy or build a $$$ Mac screen is for colour accurate work. I wish he'd done that, because it'd show whether the panel holds up vs new ones or not.

Except he didn't "build an apple screen", he repurposed an old all-in-one's screen to be used as a general purpose monitor.

Doesn't matter. Putting a new controller on an old panel still requires recalibration, because colour calibration is about the mapping between the controller & the light output from the panel. And the whole point of a studio monitor is that it's colour-accurate.

 

[Errum]

LG have been producing 5K Panels for 8 years now and the consumer hasn't seen any price reduction at all. With Apple's new display, we have a big price increase. This isn't how things are supposed to work. I remember the days when Monoprice stuck the the same 1440p 27" panel Apple were selling for $999 into a cheap enclosure and charged less than $300.

The first 5K monitor was sold by Dell for $2800, in around 2014 IIRC. With inflation that's well over $3,000.

Apple's Studio Display is $300 more than LG's $1,300 5K monitor while offering a brighter panel, much higher build quality, a built in video camera, and built in speakers, among other improvements.

That's not a big price increase over LG, it's basically the same price when you account for the brighter newer panel, the aluminum body, better stand, the video camera and the speakers. In the old days you'd expect Apple to just repackage the same panel in aluminum and jack the price 20%.

The LG does also have a built in web cam. I can’t tell you whether it’s any good or not, since I never use that feature. We have three of the LGs, and while they were the best option at the time, the Apple Studio is now a no-brainer better choice for $300 more.

 

[marsilies]

Can Apple sue this guy for lost sales? Isn't this piracy?

No. Modding your own hardware is not piracy.

I agree that it shouldn't be. But your statement isn't exactly bullet proof legal advice. Various laws sadly says otherwise. Unlocking a gaming console or in-vehicle computer isn't completely free game.

Circumventing DRM doesn't necessarily need to involve modding hardware in any way, and is explicitly illegal due to the DCMA, with some exceptions from the Library of Congress, but circumventing DRM, in and of itself, isn't piracy.

 

[Adreaver]

Can Apple sue this guy for lost sales? Isn't this piracy?

No. Modding your own hardware is not piracy.

I agree that it shouldn't be. But your statement isn't exactly bullet proof legal advice. Various laws sadly says otherwise. Unlocking a gaming console or in-vehicle computer isn't completely free game.

Those require circumventing software-based protections and DRM. This requires unplugging a bunch of shit, then plugging in a different thing.

Can't stop the signal.

 

[ERIFNOMI]

Right.

So is there a homepage where I can identify the appropriate display driver, or is there a sticker on the panel itself if I open the machine?

Sorry for the n00b questions. It's just not my field, and I'd rather admit to my ignorance than foul things up...

Figure out which panel you have and search eBay. You'll find loads of drivers.

From what I understand, doing this is not uncommon in China. The driver I ordered inverted one of the color channels even though it was supposed to work with my panel. I contacted the seller and they grabbed the same panel I had, figured out which pins were wrong, and I was able to swap them and get it working properly.

 

[Plati]

The DIY monitor seems to be a bit overly saturated to me. Still an amazing accomplishment and probably better than some of the alternatives considering just how good the Studio Display is.

 

[Nop666]

Right.

So is there a homepage where I can identify the appropriate display driver, or is there a sticker on the panel itself if I open the machine?

Sorry for the n00b questions. It's just not my field, and I'd rather admit to my ignorance than foul things up...

Figure out which panel you have and search eBay. You'll find loads of drivers.

From what I understand, doing this is not uncommon in China. The driver I ordered inverted one of the color channels even though it was supposed to work with my panel. I contacted the seller and they grabbed the same panel I had, figured out which pins were wrong, and I was able to swap them and get it working properly.

You had to swap one of the +dif/-dif signal pairs?

 

[ERIFNOMI]

Right.

So is there a homepage where I can identify the appropriate display driver, or is there a sticker on the panel itself if I open the machine?

Sorry for the n00b questions. It's just not my field, and I'd rather admit to my ignorance than foul things up...

Figure out which panel you have and search eBay. You'll find loads of drivers.

From what I understand, doing this is not uncommon in China. The driver I ordered inverted one of the color channels even though it was supposed to work with my panel. I contacted the seller and they grabbed the same panel I had, figured out which pins were wrong, and I was able to swap them and get it working properly.

You had to swap one of the +dif/-dif signal pairs?

I think that's what happened. It was awhile ago and I'm not all that familiar with LVDS anyway.

 

[Nop666]

Right.

So is there a homepage where I can identify the appropriate display driver, or is there a sticker on the panel itself if I open the machine?

Sorry for the n00b questions. It's just not my field, and I'd rather admit to my ignorance than foul things up...

Figure out which panel you have and search eBay. You'll find loads of drivers.

From what I understand, doing this is not uncommon in China. The driver I ordered inverted one of the color channels even though it was supposed to work with my panel. I contacted the seller and they grabbed the same panel I had, figured out which pins were wrong, and I was able to swap them and get it working properly.

You had to swap one of the +dif/-dif signal pairs?

I think that's what happened. It was awhile ago and I'm not all that familiar with LVDS anyway.

LVDS stands for "low voltage differential signal", so swapping a pair would have the effect of inverting one of the bits on one of the colour channels, hence my guess.

 

[ERIFNOMI]

Right.

So is there a homepage where I can identify the appropriate display driver, or is there a sticker on the panel itself if I open the machine?

Sorry for the n00b questions. It's just not my field, and I'd rather admit to my ignorance than foul things up...

Figure out which panel you have and search eBay. You'll find loads of drivers.

From what I understand, doing this is not uncommon in China. The driver I ordered inverted one of the color channels even though it was supposed to work with my panel. I contacted the seller and they grabbed the same panel I had, figured out which pins were wrong, and I was able to swap them and get it working properly.

You had to swap one of the +dif/-dif signal pairs?

I think that's what happened. It was awhile ago and I'm not all that familiar with LVDS anyway.

LVDS stands for "low voltage differential signal", so swapping a pair would have the effect of inverting one of the bits on one of the colour channels, hence my guess.

Yeah, my memory is fuzzy but I'm pretty sure that's what went down. I wasn't expecting to get that kind of support from a random ebay seller. To be honest, when it didn't work after messing with the hidden menu that let's you adjust for different panel types, I figured I'd just hit them up for a refund and try another board. Instead they asked I give them a week or so to look into it. They got back to me saying they got ahold of the same panel, found the issue, and let me know which pins were wrong. I honestly forgot that eBay has some really cool sellers that will do whatever they can to make things right.